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Again:
Mozart: String Quintet in C, K515 (1787); String Quintet in G minor, K516 (1787)
Quatuor Ébène, Antoine Tamestit (viola)
Label: Erato
When an ensemble is not naturally attuned to Mozart (and I don’t believe the Ébène are), that in itself can sometimes produce interesting results. And so it does here. It’s obvious that a lot of thought has gone into these interpretations. You can ”hear” the thinking at just about every turn. So is it overthought? A little, perhaps. But mostly not to an annoying degree, I’d say. Some of the phrasing in the slow movement of the G minor does strike me as rather self conscious, though. And there are a few instances when the Ébène turn down the temperature, so to speak, when, IMO at least, the music cries out for the opposite (the end of the development section of K515’s first movement is a case in point). In fact, the more I listened to these recordings, the more I missed the more natural eloquence of, say, the Talich, the Kuijkens, the old Fine Arts Quartet and the underrated Sine Nomine.
Needless to say, these readings are outstandingly well played. But for all their conscientiousness and proficiency the Ébène and Tamestit fail to bring me face to face with the living, breathing, sweating man.
There is also a certain glassiness to the ensemble’s sound as recorded here that I find quite tiring (but that may be an unfair assessment, since I’ve only been streaming this release).
Mozart: String Quintet in C, K515 (1787); String Quintet in G minor, K516 (1787)
Quatuor Ébène, Antoine Tamestit (viola)
Label: Erato
Needless to say, these readings are outstandingly well played. But for all their conscientiousness and proficiency the Ébène and Tamestit fail to bring me face to face with the living, breathing, sweating man.
There is also a certain glassiness to the ensemble’s sound as recorded here that I find quite tiring (but that may be an unfair assessment, since I’ve only been streaming this release).
